Mr. Vampire

Set in Republican-era China, the supernatural comedy Mr. Vampire draws on Hunan folklore about walking corpses, blending it with imagery from Western vampire and zombie traditions. The film’s action choreographer, Lam Ching-ying, also stars as a Taoist priest who, together with his two apprentices, attempts to stop a deceased wealthy man from turning into a bloodthirsty vampire.

Andrew Lau, originally a camera assistant to Peter Ngor, unexpectedly stepped into the role of cinematographer when Ngor was called away to another production. His flair for visual storytelling was immediately evident. For one of the film’s most iconic scenes, in which one of the apprentices (Chin Siu-ho) encounters a ghost girl (Pauline Wong) in a moonlit forest, Lau used three generators and more than a hundred lights to create a dreamlike yet eerie atmosphere. The scene of the ghost girl gently descending onto the young man’s bicycle in slow motion, accompanied by the film’s haunting theme song in a treble voice, remains one of the most memorable scenes in Hong Kong ghost films.

Mr. Vampire became a box-office sensation in both Hong Kong and Taiwan, launching a wave of vampire films in Hong Kong cinema. It also marked the beginning of Lam Ching-ying’s iconic screen persona as a Taoist priest battling vampires, and established 25-year-old Andrew Lau as one of the most exciting new cinematographers in Hong Kong cinema.

Date	Time	Venue
5/9/2026 (Sat) #	3:30pm	Cinema, Hong Kong Film Archive

# Post-screening talk with Andrew Lau Wai-keung and Thomas Shin (moderator)

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